Has the story of human evolution moved beyond “survival of the fittest?” What if instead of seeing humans as ultra-competitors, we saw ourselves as an ultra-social, super-cooperative species? Join us as we examine human morality through the lens of evolution. Read our contributors' thoughts as they explore the biological and cultural foundations for the development of morality, and share your own ideas on the roots of morality.

Watch videos from our special live event, Love + Evolution, in partnership with Wisconsin Public Radio's To the Best of Our Knowledge.

This series was made possible through the generous support of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed here are those of the Center's Scholars and Contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation.

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We can rationalize all sorts of moralities and mindsets and we choose these through discovering what feels better or worse. We have instincts for compassion and narcissism and we create with them in our minds. I can feel good and bad exploring both mindsets but choosing compassion feels much better overall for many reasons. Evolution has endowed us with these instincts because compassion moves humans to co-operate and enables us to trust each other and organize. Narcissism helps us not care about our cultures lack of compassion toward "others." Compassion and narcissism evolved in us because they give us advantages in the wild eating environment. Compassion gives us warm feelings that help us band together. Narcissism helps us take life for our own survival. Humans must take life to survive, we must consume other lifeforms, other living beings. Even the raw food vegan is eating seeds and preventing their growth or consuming leaves and preventing them from absorbing and transforming the sun's energy. These instincts can also be taken up by our minds to work against our survival. If we have so much compassion that we cannot consume other beings, we will die... although Memphis Meats begins to solve this. And if we direct our narcissism towards humans, bad feelings and violence will ensue. Humans do not like to be treated like an "other." When this happens inside a culture, inequality and enslavement can become written and casted into law. When it happens toward other cultures, war and empire building occurs. These are natural outcomes but hardly inevitable. Our physical safety and cleanliness and health can be better protected using our instincts for compassion and narcissism more effectively. Humans have evolved into learning beings. Cultures around the world reward and honor humans who learn really well. From birth our minds race to understand and each new generation has the opportunity to add to the collective knowledge, whether it's in the tribe, culture, nation, or species.